Operational Flood Working Groups

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Wiltshire Council has set up two Operational Flood Working Groups, one in the north and the other in the south of county.

The groups operate under strict terms of reference and are chaired by elected members, Councillors Jonathon Seed in the North and Mike Hewitt in the South. Councillor Richard Tonge is the portfolio holder and attends both meetings.

The groups mirror the river catchment areas operated by the Environment Agency and are a forum for stakeholders with interests in Highways Surface Water, Surface Water Run Off, Drainage and Flooding to consider the issues relating to flooding and drainage within their respective catchment areas. Stakeholders include Wessex Water, Thames Water, the Highways Agency, Network Rail and the Environment Agency.

These issues cover such items as:

• Identifying lead authorities for each issue to enable better more focused, efficient and coordinated response, enabling resources and funding to be targeted effectively
• To make recommendations for bids to fund major projects
• To consider proposals for prioritising funding and programming of schemes
• To implement Government legislation on drainage and flood management
• To comply with legal requirements to map our surface water and establish collaborative information with our partners.
• To respond to Community Area Boards in respect of flooding and drainage issues
• To communicate with members of the public regarding the work we are doing via the Wiltshire Magazine and Parish Newsletter

Initial requests for assistance from the public will be assessed by staff from the Divisional Highways Offices. If they cannot be dealt with locally they will be referred to the drainage engineers. The Weather and Drainage Manager will prioritise schemes in accordance with the following criteria

Flooding Affecting	Objective	Response
People	Protect life	Evacuation
Houses	Protect life and dwellings	Flood alleviation equipment
Commercial Property	Project property	Protect critical utilities infrastructure
Roads	Protect life, dwellings and essential access to main roads	Road closures, diversions and flood alleviation equipment
Gardens/Agricultural Land	None	No action taken

Dates and venues of the next Operational Flood Working Group meetings

Town and parish councils wishing to attend the meeting are to advise the secretary of the group renate.malton@wiltshire.gov.uk of their attendance and issues they would like discussed.

North	South
16 May 2012 Committee Room A and B Monkton Park Offices Chippenham	20 June 2012 Training Room Churchfields Depot Churchfields Industrial Estate Salisbury

Notes of the Operational Flood Working Group (OFWG) Meetings

You can read the notes of the latest Operational Flood Working Group meetings below. The meetings alternate monthly between the north and south of the county.

• Notes of the joint OFWG meeting -14 March 2012 46kb

Last updated: 30 April 2012